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Posted:31st Jan 2006You've noticed how many newbies have joined recently, So is it me or is poi gradually getting more mainstream? also I keep seeing poi on tv here and there, plus the fact that my child's primary school is beginning classes for the circus arts, to promote healthy living and keeping active.

It looks like it may get bigger soon, and I'm worried it will escalate out of control, but it may, like all the other crazes, disappear quietly and we can continue living by the poi as we have always done.

Oh yeah this is chat so i will say........lol!

Always use "so's your face" and "only on Tuesdays" in as many conversations possible

Sonya started fire dancing after she saw first-hand how beautiful it could be. A couple of years later, she's realized that poi isn't just about making fire pretty. It's also a fun, effective way to work out.

Sonya's Story

"I came to realize that poi was similar to the Heavy Hands workout."

I went to a lecture by Joe Dillon about the Heavy Hands workout. Basically, when a person is walking, they are getting a certain amount of aerobic activity, but if you had your hands doing different exercises while you're walking, you get an exponentially greater benefit. After hearing him speak, I realized that the poi workout I was doing was similar to Heavy Hands.

Heavy Hands involves walking and moving your arms, but with poi you can dance around and get all of your body really into it, not just your arms. It's more fun than Heavy Hands.

"That was a phenomenal first-time fire experience."

The first time I saw poi, I was at a farm party for a friend's birthday. There was a big bonfire, and we were all playing drums, and this girl comes out. All of the sudden, I'm seeing these big circles of fire and she's moving them and she's manipulating them with her hands, and I got to play drums for her fire dancing, or playing poi.

I took a couple of poi workshops at a dance studio. They teach you with fabric poi, so that if they hit you upside the head, they're not really going to hurt. There's also glow poi and poi with streamers on it so that you kind of get a tail that goes around in the circles. I practiced really, really hard for about a month on the fire poi before I ever lit them up.

"If you play with fire, you're gonna get burned."

The first time you light them up, you think you're going to do this trick and that trick, but really what you're doing is, "Whoa, that's a really big flame. That's scary." I probably did about three special moves that I knew how to do that first time that I lit them on fire and that was about it. Then I was, like, "Okay, let's put them down now."

It takes two and a half seconds for it to burn your skin or clothes, so we wear denim and leather a lot. No loose, floppy clothes. We spray water in our hair. I've had a poi kind of smack me in the arm and it didn't bounce off like it normally does, so I had a little wick pattern on my arm for about four days. I singed my hair one time when I was out playing in somebody's yard, and I didn't freak out, but I hated the smell of burning hair. It was a quick little singe, just enough to mess up my hair-cut and make me mad.

"I started noticing all the benefits I was feeling in my body."

One day I was realizing how good I felt when I was doing a poi workout. You're working on a move, you finally get it, and all of the sudden it's a lot easier for some reason. There's just a breakthrough. But I wouldn't really call it a poi workout, I was playing with poi for an hour, and I was just playing but I was getting a lot of exercise. I have more aerobic energy. I get more breath down into my lungs. I eat a lot of stuff that I want to eat and can work it off. It builds lots of body heat, and if you do it enough you're sweating. You probably get more stretching than Heavy Hands because you're stretching to do tricks behind your back or over your head.

"The nice thing about poi is I can practice it on my own and be enthralled."

Usually I'm working on two or three tricks all at once so that gets me excited and keeps me motivated. I can fall out of practice too for a couple of weeks at a time just depending on how my life is going, but I can get back into on my own. It's not like I have to go to the aerobics class to get the benefit of the workout. And by learning new tricks, you start working different parts of your body. My legs got a lot stronger when I was working hard to learn one trick. I've got a lot more muscle definition. And it's all from playing around for 20 minutes a day.

Linky link

Thanks for that Sonja - wherever you are...

We will have poi lessons in gyms - why not It's the next fitness hype, I tell ya... EDITED_BY: FireTom (1169807396)

Posted:31st Jan 2007Meenik (Nick Woolsey) made a video called 'Skill Toys for Health' a while ago. I think he's onto a winner. Poi / staff / juggling / etc. is brilliant for muscle toning and (if you play for a while) a great cardiovascular workout.